Meskhetian Turks also known as Meskheti Turks, and Akhaltsikhe / Ahiska Turks (Turkish: Ahıska Türkleri; Georgian: თურქი მესხები, t'urk'i meskhebi) are the ethnic Turks formerly inhabiting the Meskheti region of Georgia, along the border with Turkey. The Turkish presence in Meskheti began with the Ottoman invasion of 1578, although Turkic tribes had settled in the region as early as the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

The origin of the Meskhetian is still unexplored and highly controversial. But now it seems to emerge two main directions:

The pro-Turkish direction: The Meskhetians were ethnic Turks, in which some Georgian were ethnic parts.
The pro-Georgian direction: Georgian historiography has traditionally argued that the Meskhetian Turks, who speak the Kars dialect of the Turkish language and belong to the Hanafi school of Sunni Islam, are simply Turkified Georgians converted to Islam in the period between the sixteenth century and 1829 when the region of Meskheti-Dzhavakheti was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire.

However, Anatoly Michailovich Khazanov has argued that "it is quite possible that the adherents of this view oversimplified the ethnic history of the group, particularly if one compares it with another Muslim Georgian group, the Adzhar, who in spite of their conversion to Islam have retained, not only the Georgian language, but to some extent also the Georgian tradition culture and self-identification. Contrary to this, the traditional culture of Meshetian Turks, though it contained some Georgian elements, was similar to the Turkish one". Kathryn Tomlinson has argued that in Soviet documents about the 1944 deportations of the Meskhetian Turks they were referred to simply as "Turks", and that it was after their second deportation from Uzbekistan that the term "Meskhetian Turks" was invented. Furthermore, according to Ronald Wixman, the term "Meskhetian" only came into use in the late 1950s. Indeed, majority of the Meskhetians call themselves simply as "Turks" or "Ahiskan Turks (Ahıska Türkleri)" referring to the region, meaning "Turks of Ahiska Region". The Meskhetians claim sometimes that the medieval Cumans-Kipchaks of Georgia (Kipchaks in Georgia) may have been one of their possible ancestors

In 1578, the Ottoman Empire managed to conquer Meskheti during the Ottoman-Safavid War (1578-1590), although it was not secure as a part of the Ottoman Empire until 1639, when a treaty was signed and brought an end to Persian attempts to retake the region.
Soviet rule

According to the 1989 Soviet Census, there were 207,502 Turks living in the Soviet Union. However, Soviet authorities recorded many Meskhetian Turks as belonging to other nationalities such as "Azeri", "Kazakh", "Kyrgyz", and "Uzbek". Hence, official censuses do not necessarily show a true reflection of the real population of the Meskhetian Turks; for example, according to the 2009 Azerbaijani census, there were 38,000 Turks living in the country; however, no distinction is made in the census between Meskhetian Turks and Turks from Turkey who have become Azerbaijani citizens, as both groups are classified in the official census as "Turks" or "Azerbaijani". According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees report published in 1999, that 100,000 Meskhetian Turks lived in Azerbaijan and the defunct Baku Institute of Peace and Democracy stated, in 2001, that between 90,000 and 110,000 Meskhetian Turks lived in Azerbaijan, similarly, academic estimates have also suggested that the Meskhetian Turksish community of Azerbaijan numbers 90,000 to 110,000.

More recently, some Meskhetian Turks in Russia, especially those in Krasnodar, have faced hostility from the local population. The Krasnodar Meskhetian Turks have suffered significant human rights violations, including the deprivation of their citizenship. They are deprived of civil, political and social rights and are prohibited from owning property and employment. Thus, since 2004, many Turks have left the Krasnodar region for the United States as refugees. (A large population of which, comprises nearly 1300 individuals is in Dayton, Ohio).

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